- Hello, lovely students and welcome back to English with Lucy. Before we start today's
lesson, I've got a question for you. Can you understand what I'm saying and I really hope
you said yes because I often read comments on my videos saying things like I can understand
you perfectly but I can't understand my coworkers. Or why can I understand you but I have to
watch British series and films with subtitles. Well, in today's lesson I'm going to explain
why you have so much difficulty understanding native speakers and I'll give you some tips
to help you overcome these challenges. Now, before we get started, don't forget to download
today's PDF. It's a free PDF that comes with today's lesson. It's going to give you a detailed
explanation of each of today's points as well as a quiz to test your understanding. We'll
also mark out some key vocabulary, so you get a little vocab bonus there. If you would
like to download that free PDF, all you've got to do is click on the link in the description
box. You enter your name and your email address. You sign up to my mailing list and then the
PDF arrives directly in your inbox. And after that you've joined the PDF club. You will
automatically receive my free weekly lesson PDFs along with all of my other news course
offers and updates. It's a free service you can unsubscribe at any time. Okay, let's get
started with the lesson. Tip number one, understand that spoken English is different from textbook
or school English. This is a really important concept to understand is going to help you
so much. Now, simply put the English that native speakers use in everyday life is generally
very different to the English that you learn at school. I'm talking about casual everyday
type English that you'd use in daily conversations. Now, I'll admit it when I speak in my YouTube
and course videos, I do speak at a slightly slower pace. I choose my words carefully and
I make sure that my register is suitable for English learners. I want you to be able to
understand each word I say. But most native speakers you meet on the street will not necessarily
have the same mindset. Or they might not be as able to change their register to adapt
to learners of English. Take my mother for example. Many years ago I had a Spanish boyfriend
who didn't speak English and watching my mother try to talk to him was pretty hilarious. She
was using idioms, phrasal verbs, dropping her Ts, messing around with the pronunciation
and the poor guy stood no chance for a number of reasons and not just when it comes to understanding
my mother. Here are some examples of how spoken English and textbook English might differ
from a grammar standpoint. There are certain tenses and grammatical structures that are
far more commonly used in written English than they are in spoken English, like the
passive voice which is a grammatical construction used to emphasise the action or object rather
than the subject or doer. It's often preferred in academic writing formal reports and professional
documents. For example, the decision was made by the committee. Sticking on the topic of
grammar you may have been taught that you shouldn't end sentences with prepositions.
Well I'm here to tell you that native speakers do it all the time. It might be confusing
to hear a random preposition at the end of a sentence, but trust me, it's really common.
Like in this example, who are you going with? It honestly sounds way too proper to say With
whom are you going? Obviously, if you say it without the accent with whom are you going
it sounds slightly less proper but it sounds old fashioned at best. Another example, it
sounds way more natural to say she didn't know who to give the gift to rather than the
textbook English version she didn't know to whom to give the gift. I also want to point
out that we tend to bend other rules a bit when speaking. For example, you might hear
someone say I haven't got any money which is common in spoken British English. While
in school you're most likely taught to say I don't have any money. Another example of
this is in the expression can't believe it, where we drop the subject and utilise the
contraction of cannot. Obviously, you are taught in school to always include a subject
like I cannot believe it but that doesn't always happen in conversation. Tip number
two. Get feedback from trained, qualified professionals. If you are serious about truly
mastering English there really is no better way than one-on-one sessions with a qualified
professional. Trying to progress without feedback is really bloody hard. There's no better place
to do this than LanguaTalk which is a company that I think is so awesome. I decided to become
a part of it. So technically I'm sponsoring myself here. LanguaTalk is an online language
tutor platform with incredibly high quality teachers. Across all the languages they only
accept around 10% of applicants, but for English it's much lower. Their standards are that
high. I'm currently using it to learn Italian. My husband will uses it to learn Spanish and
you can join us and learn English there. The teachers are top notch. Now, a little incentive.
I will give you $10 in lesson credit if you sign up and take your first lesson after watching
this video. So as well as being able to log in, look through all the teacher's profile
videos, book a 30 minute trial lesson for free. You can also claim $10 towards lessons
by messaging their support team with the code EWL10. This is valid for anyone signing up
from today onwards. The link is in the description box. Have a look, have a browse, and find
your perfect fit for a tutor. Tip number three, native speakers don't articulate. This is
the topic of connected speech. So one of the things I'm sure you'll pick up on while listening
to British content or in conversations with your LanguaTalk tutor or native English speaking
friends, is that we love to squish our words together and get information out as quickly
and efficiently as possible, and this is known as connected speech which refers to the way
words are linked together in natural fluent speech. Now, there are several key aspects
of connected speech that you need to be aware of. And I'm not going to go too deep into
this right now but I want you to be aware of certain features you will definitely hear
in spoken British English. We'll start with elision. Elision is the omission or leaving
out of certain sounds and speech often to make pronunciation more efficient and fluid.
In British English, the most common example is the dropping of the final t sound in words
like not, but and what. For example, I don't know, might be pronounced as I don' know,
no t sound to be found there. Assimilation. Assimilation occurs when a sound changes to
become more like a neighbouring sound. In British English this often happens with the
t and d sounds when followed by a y sound t and y often sounds like ch and d and y often
sounds like j. For example. Got you, go'chew. Would you, wou'jew? Now, this one is really
fun. The intrusive r. In British English an r sound is sometimes inserted between two
vow sounds to make the transition smoother and this is particularly common in non-erotic
accents such as received pronunciation or modern received pronunciation, my accent.
For example, law and order may be pronounced as law-r-and order. I've inserted an Ur R
sound that isn't meant to be there but I've put it there because it's easier for me. Now
as well as the intrusive r we also have the linking r, and this is really similar but
it occurs when a word ending in the letter r is followed by a word beginning with a vowel
sound. In non-erotic accents the r is pronounced to connect the two words. For example far
away may be pronounced as fa-raway, fa-raway. Far on its own no r sound, but when followed
by a word starting with a vowel sound fa-raway, it's just natural to put it in there. And
let's look at weak forms. In connected speech, certain words are often pronounced with a
reduced or weak form. And this is particularly common with function words such as prepositions
articles and auxiliary verbs. For example, two may be pronounced as t and and maybe pronounced
as n. So. That was a very quick overview. We do have more videos on connected speech.
It is actually one of my favourite topics. Understanding how frequently connected speech
is used will go a long way in improving your comprehension skills. Let's move on to tip
four contractions and unique language features. I feel like contractions go hand in hand with
connected speech. Contractions as I have talked about in previous videos refer to the shortening
of words by combining two or more words, there are sometimes triplets in there, together.
This process involves emitting certain letters and replacing them with an apostrophe. In
spoken English native speakers pretty much always use contractions. For example, we don't
say, I am from England. We say I'm from England, I'm is the contraction there. Here are some
common contractions, but please be sure to download today's PDF to see a full list. As
I said before, the link is in the description box. We have, I'm, you're, we're, they're,
he's, she's, it's, I've, you've, we've, they've, I'll, you'll, we'll, they'll, can't, didn't,
won't, coulda, woulda, shoulda let's, there's, that's, I could go on forever about contractions
and maybe I should let me know if you want a focused video on contractions. Now we also
have informal contractions which combine two or more words into shorter words but they
are quite informal and they're used in very casual conversations like in this sentence.
I hafta go to the shops if you wanna come rather than I have to go to the shops if you
want to come. These kinds of informal contractions are extremely popular and tend to cause a
lot of confusion for English learners so the more familiar you become with them, the quicker
your listening skills will improve. Here we have some very common ones like usta, kinda,
lotsa, coulda, Ida, sheeda, how'dja, and what'dja. Final tip, learn idioms and slang. If you
want to understand native speakers this is unavoidable. As English learners I'm sure
you were taught to speak in a very direct form of English to say exactly what you mean.
But unfortunately native speakers don't often speak in such a way. We tend to use a lot
of slang and idioms because it adds colour and character to what we're trying to say
and I'm sure you do the same in your native language. I know I said that connected speech
is one of my favourite things to teach, but I actually think that idioms and slang is
too, I can't decide, so I won't. I'll just enjoy them both. Slang and idioms are often
used to express ideas or emotions in a more creative and nuanced way than standard direct
English but this also tends to make it challenging for English learners to understand. Here are
some very common slang terms that you will most likely encounter in daily conversation.
Grub. Food, particularly pub food or unhealthy food food that fills you. Lurgy. An unspecified
mild illness or feeling unwell. It's like a general call or I've got some sort of lurgy.
Dab hand. If you're a dab hand at something you are skilled or proficient at something.
Fit, this is used to mean attractive rather than just physically fit which which it means
a normal English and slang English. If I say you are so fit, it means you are so attractive.
We also have merry or tipsy meaning slightly drunk while wasted or pissed signifies being
heavily intoxicated. Be careful because pissed in British English means heavily drunk and
pissed in American English means angry. In British English we tend to say pissed off,
a phrasal verb. One of my favourites, I use this all the time, knackered, if you are knackered,
you are extremely tired. I also like to say chuffed. Ah, which means very happy or pleased
or kind of smug and satisfied. I'm chuffed with my exam result. Okay, I have put loads
more idioms and slang phrases in the pdf, so don't forget to download that. If you enjoy
learning about slang and idioms let me know and I can make a dedicated video for you.
It's something I enjoy teaching, so if you like it and I like it, I mean we should get
together and and make a video. Right, that's it from me. That's it for today's lesson.
I really hope these tips help you. Again, don't forget about the PDF. The link is there.
It's designed to help you and don't forget about that offer on LanguaTalk. It really
is an awesome platform. Otherwise, I wouldn't have become a part of it. Use that code for
your discount. Just send it to the support team after enrolling in your first lesson.
If you weren't aware, we have recently launched our B1 B2 and C1 programmes. Please don't
forget to check those out if you're looking to take your English really, really seriously.
And I will see you soon for another lesson. Bye.